Meteor camera networks can reveal the hidden history of the solar system, and you can assist from your own backyard We need to keep better track of invaders from space. And by invaders, I mean meteors. And by we, I mean you —or, more accurately, any astronomy nerd who can. Meteors, sometimes poetically, if not terribly accurately, called shooting stars, are the luminous displays that occur when cosmic debris—usually small bits of rock or metal—hits Earth's air.